{"id":2560,"date":"2013-06-21T19:37:48","date_gmt":"2013-06-21T23:37:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateofshakespeare.com\/?page_id=2560"},"modified":"2025-08-04T12:15:31","modified_gmt":"2025-08-04T16:15:31","slug":"a-midsummer-nights-dream-act-ii-scene-i","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/stateofshakespeare.com\/?page_id=2560","title":{"rendered":"A Midsummer Night’s Dream: Act II, Scene i"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Midsummer Night’s Dream.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Act 2, Scene 1.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Oberon & Titania<\/strong><\/p>\n

(This text is featured in our\u00a0interview with the Theatricum Botanicum<\/a>)<\/p>\n

OBERON<\/strong>
\n60\u00a0 Ill met by moonlight, proud Titania.<\/p>\n

TITANIA<\/strong>
\n61\u00a0 What, jealous Oberon! Fairies, skip hence:
\n62\u00a0 I have forsworn his bed and company.<\/p>\n

OBERON<\/strong>
\n63\u00a0 Tarry, rash wanton: am not I thy lord?<\/p>\n

TITANIA<\/strong>
\n64\u00a0 Then I must be thy lady: but I know
\n65\u00a0 When thou hast stolen away from fairy land,
\n66\u00a0 And in the shape of Corin sat all day,
\n67\u00a0 Playing on pipes of corn and versing love
\n68\u00a0 To amorous Phillida. Why art thou here,
\n69\u00a0 Come from the farthest Steppe of India?
\n70\u00a0 But that, forsooth, the bouncing Amazon,
\n71\u00a0 Your buskin’d mistress and your warrior love,
\n72\u00a0 To Theseus must be wedded, and you come
\n73\u00a0 To give their bed joy and prosperity.<\/p>\n

OBERON<\/strong>
\n74\u00a0 How canst thou thus for shame, Titania,
\n75\u00a0 Glance at my credit with Hippolyta,
\n76\u00a0 Knowing I know thy love to Theseus?
\n77\u00a0 Didst thou not lead him through the glimmering night
\n78\u00a0 From Perigenia, whom he ravished?
\n79\u00a0 And make him with fair Aegle break his faith,
\n80\u00a0 With Ariadne and Antiopa?<\/p>\n

TITANIA<\/strong>
\n81\u00a0 These are the forgeries of jealousy:
\n82\u00a0 And never, since the middle summer’s spring,
\n83\u00a0 Met we on hill, in dale, forest or mead,
\n84\u00a0 By paved fountain or by rushy brook,
\n85\u00a0 Or in the beached margent of the sea,
\n86\u00a0 To dance our ringlets to the whistling wind,
\n87\u00a0 But with thy brawls thou hast disturb’d our sport.
\n88\u00a0 Therefore the winds, piping to us in vain,
\n89\u00a0 As in revenge, have suck’d up from the sea
\n90\u00a0 Contagious fogs; which falling in the land
\n91\u00a0 Have every pelting river made so proud
\n92\u00a0 That they have overborne their continents:
\n93\u00a0 The ox hath therefore stretch’d his yoke in vain,
\n94\u00a0 The ploughman lost his sweat, and the green corn
\n95\u00a0 Hath rotted ere his youth attain’d a beard;
\n96\u00a0 The fold stands empty in the drowned field,
\n97\u00a0 And crows are fatted with the murrion flock;
\n98\u00a0 The nine men’s morris is fill’d up with mud,
\n99\u00a0 And the quaint mazes in the wanton green
\n100\u00a0 For lack of tread are undistinguishable:
\n101\u00a0 The human mortals want their winter here;
\n102\u00a0 No night is now with hymn or carol blest:
\n103\u00a0 Therefore the moon, the governess of floods,
\n104\u00a0 Pale in her anger, washes all the air,
\n105\u00a0 That rheumatic diseases do abound:
\n106\u00a0 And thorough this distemperature we see
\n107\u00a0 The seasons alter: hoary-headed frosts
\n108\u00a0 Fall in the fresh lap of the crimson rose,
\n109\u00a0 And on old Hiems’ thin and icy crown
\n110\u00a0 An odorous chaplet of sweet summer buds
\n111\u00a0 Is, as in mockery, set: the spring, the summer,
\n112\u00a0 The childing autumn, angry winter, change
\n113\u00a0 Their wonted liveries, and the mazed world,
\n114\u00a0 By their increase, now knows not which is which:
\n115\u00a0 And this same progeny of evils comes
\n116\u00a0 From our debate, from our dissension;
\n117\u00a0 We are their parents and original.<\/p>\n

OBERON<\/strong>
\n118\u00a0 Do you amend it then; it lies in you:
\n119\u00a0 Why should Titania cross her Oberon?
\n120\u00a0 I do but beg a little changeling boy,
\n121\u00a0 To be my henchman.<\/p>\n

TITANIA<\/strong>
\n122\u00a0 Set your heart at rest:
\n123\u00a0 The fairy land buys not the child of me.
\n124\u00a0 His mother was a votaress of my order:
\n125\u00a0 And, in the spiced Indian air, by night,
\n126\u00a0 Full often hath she gossip’d by my side,
\n127\u00a0 And sat with me on Neptune’s yellow sands,
\n128\u00a0 Marking the embarked traders on the flood,
\n129\u00a0 When we have laugh’d to see the sails conceive
\n130\u00a0 And grow big-bellied with the wanton wind;
\n131\u00a0 Which she, with pretty and with swimming gait
\n132\u00a0 Following,–her womb then rich with my young squire,–
\n133\u00a0 Would imitate, and sail upon the land,
\n134\u00a0 To fetch me trifles, and return again,
\n135\u00a0 As from a voyage, rich with merchandise.
\n136\u00a0 But she, being mortal, of that boy did die:
\n137\u00a0 And for her sake do I rear up her boy,
\n138\u00a0 And for her sake I will not part with him.<\/p>\n

OBERON<\/strong>
\n139\u00a0 How long within this wood intend you stay?<\/p>\n

TITANIA<\/strong>
\n140\u00a0 Perchance till after Theseus’ wedding-day.
\n141\u00a0 If you will patiently dance in our round
\n142\u00a0 And see our moonlight revels, go with us;
\n143\u00a0 If not, shun me, and I will spare your haunts.<\/p>\n

OBERON<\/strong>
\n144\u00a0 Give me that boy, and I will go with thee.<\/p>\n

TITANIA<\/strong>
\n145\u00a0 Not for thy fairy kingdom. Fairies, away!
\n146\u00a0 We shall chide downright, if I longer stay.<\/p>\n

(Exit TITANIA with her train)<\/em><\/address>\n

OBERON<\/strong>
\n147\u00a0 Well, go thy way: thou shalt not from this grove
\n148\u00a0 Till I torment thee for this injury.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Midsummer Night’s Dream.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Act 2, Scene 1.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Oberon & Titania (This text is featured in our\u00a0interview with the Theatricum Botanicum) OBERON 60\u00a0 Ill met by moonlight, proud Titania. TITANIA 61\u00a0 What, jealous Oberon! Fairies, skip hence: 62\u00a0 I have forsworn his bed and company. OBERON 63\u00a0 Tarry, rash wanton: am not I thy lord? TITANIA<\/p>\n [...]<\/a>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-2560","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry","post-seq-1","post-parity-odd","meta-position-line-bottom","fix"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/P2Frfq-Fi","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateofshakespeare.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2560","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateofshakespeare.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateofshakespeare.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateofshakespeare.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateofshakespeare.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2560"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/stateofshakespeare.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2560\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9178,"href":"https:\/\/stateofshakespeare.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2560\/revisions\/9178"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateofshakespeare.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2560"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}